Older GPS to SeaClear

[GWB]

My friend and I are going to attempt to connect his apelco gsl 1100 gps to a laptop running seaclear.

Seaclear says most pc 9 pin connector is pin 2 for recieve and 3 for transmit, and pin 5 for ground.
The apelco has an nmea 0183 output that has two wires, data (+) and data(-) I assume these are transmit + and recieve -

My plan is to connect pin 2 on the pc to the + wire and pin 3 on the pc to the - wire.

Has anyone else tried intefacing one of these older apelco units to a pc?
I only really need the transmit fromn the apelco to the pc, but without some kind ground wire I'm wondering if that will work

Thanks for any input

[scotte]

data(+) should go to receive (into the computer).
Nothing goes on transmit (from the computer).
Ground on the computer side should go to a common ground to the GPS.
data(-) shouldn't be needed.

[osirissail]

If your computer has a serial port then the connection is very simple and straight forward. If you computer has only USB ports then you need an adaptor cable that converts Serial to USB along with a driver disk. Also very straight forward and not difficult.

[richardhula]

Originally Posted by GWB

My friend and I are going to attempt to connect his apelco gsl 1100 gps to a laptop running seaclear.

Seaclear says most pc 9 pin connector is pin 2 for recieve and 3 for transmit, and pin 5 for ground.
The apelco has an nmea 0183 output that has two wires, data (+) and data(-) I assume these are transmit + and recieve -

My plan is to connect pin 2 on the pc to the + wire and pin 3 on the pc to the - wire.

Has anyone else tried intefacing one of these older apelco units to a pc?
I only really need the transmit fromn the apelco to the pc, but without some kind ground wire I'm wondering if that will work

Thanks for any input

What you suggest won't work as you make an incorrect assumption about the GPS feed. The +ve lead should go to pin 2 but the -ve lead goes to pin 5 on the dsub 9 pin connector.

This assumes that the laptop is an old one with a COM port using a dsub 9 pin connector. It can be identified as the D shaped connector with 9 male pins showing.

Laptops for several years now have not been supplied with such, the answer being a commonly available USB to COM port adaptor.

[osirissail]

Here is a diagram from my archives of older GPS connections to computers, etc.

[GWB]

Thanks for all the replies....yes the pc has a 9 pin dsub connector.

Is the pin 5 connector on the pc a ground or a signal common? Reason I ask is the apelco unit says this about ground:
"Do NOT GROUND the data, data return lines or shield at any of the external navigation equipments."

[richardhula]

Originally Posted by GWB

Thanks for all the replies....yes the pc has a 9 pin dsub connector.

Is the pin 5 connector on the pc a ground or a signal common? Reason I ask is the apelco unit says this about ground:
"Do NOT GROUND the data, data return lines or shield at any of the external navigation equipments."

Pin 5 is the common signal -ve. Sometimes there is a requirement to strap NMEA signal common -ve to boat battery -ve/earth, but in this case just connecting to the two pins I mentioned should work.

[scotte]

Originally Posted by GWB

Is the pin 5 connector on the pc a ground or a signal common? Reason I ask is the apelco unit says this about ground:
"Do NOT GROUND the data, data return lines or shield at any of the external navigation equipments."

This is precisely why I recommended leaving this unconnected and using a common ground for the RS-232 signal-ground reference. The manual (which I found at the Raymarine site) is not clear if the Apelco unit is single-ended or differential, and you could argue that data (-) could refer to either. If it's a differential output you absolutely do not want to connect that to signal ground (as it's not). If it's single-ended than you could, though a common reference ground should suffice.